FH as usual ignores the parts of my posts he does not like and goes back to historical BS of 50 , 60 100 years ago. No comment on the fact their money is not theirs to do with what they want unless the Communists turn a blind eye.

I'll be more impressed when any family can take their money and move to any country that will have them . That is the difference between democracy and freedom and Communism!

I have never disputed the fact that many people in China are far better off then they were 25 , 50, 100, 500 ,1000 years ago. Never disputed with the help of the Stupid Western Countries , the Communists have pulled a significant portion of their population out of poverty and many of them into what we would consider middle class or higher.

That does not for a minute change the fact that the people have no rights . The money they have is theirs as long as the Communists don't take it back .

The rules can change at any moment and believe me a great portion of their population is still in or near poverty levels. They have no freedom to take their money and do what they want with it if the Communists choose to say no. And believe me if their power is questioned , they will say no.

It took them thousands of years to get to where they are now and they are still a long way from being free and being able to do and say what they want without the Communists checking them.

And by the way it is true I have not visited China for many years . However I have continued to visit HongKong and find the atmosphere in the city completely different since the Communists took HongKong back. I liked it a lot better when it was controlled by Capitalists instead of Communists. But most of the capitalists took their money and left before the Communists took over. I know that for sure since many of them moved to the USA. I see them in all our cities . Successful enteprenours in many different locations. And guess what they can take their money and do what they want with it.

Let me know when that happens in Communist China. Then I will really be impressed. Just like I'll be impressed when they they invent or build something new where they did not steal the intellectual property . Another fact that you always manage not to reply to.

fountainhall wrote:The assumption in the above is that North Korea actually intends to start a nuclear war.

I made no such assumption. The point I'm trying to make is China is not living up to enforcing UN sanctions that they voted for - and I don't understand why. Why would China want to tolerate a nuclear capable North Korea? Why is China violating the UN sanctions?

Another one of my problems with the Communists in China which should hit closer to home. Who steps up when there are natural disasters? Certainly not the 2nd biggest economic power in the world. Here is just one example of the joke aid provided to Thailand after the Tsunami by the world .

Gaybutton wrote:Why would China want to tolerate a nuclear capable North Korea?

I have no idea other than it believes this is more acceptable than having US nuclear weapons on the Peninsula and therefore on its doorstep. You can also ask - but then no one seems to care about this: why would Russia tolerate a nuclear North Korea? After all those countries also share a border. It is not unusual for countries with opposing views or ideologies to tolerate, like it or not, nuclear powers on their borders. China was a sworn enemy of the Soviet Union when it developed its own nuclear weapons. Pakistan is generally regarded as at least a semi-rogue state. It has nuclear weapons. Its neighbour and often adversary India also has nuclear weapons! The USA and Russia may seem much more distant. But as Sarah Palin clearly stated - the actual distance between these two nuclear powers is one small strip of water.

Gaybutton wrote:Where are you getting the idea that the USA intends to place nuclear weapons on the Peninsula? I've neither seen nor heard any indication of that. And I doubt Russia and China would sit still for it.

I don't think I have ever said the the US "intends" to place nukes on the Korean Peninsula. Have I? But the issue has been discussed very frequently - even although the majority of experts believe it would not be a good idea. A couple of examples -

On Monday [4 September 2017], South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo noted he talked to US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis about placing American nuclear weapons in the country for the first time in over 25 years.

Chinese experts believe North Korea’s leaders pursue nuclear weapons because they feel genuinely threatened by the United States and South Korea. In a Brookings Institution strategy paper published in May 2017, Fu Ying, a retired diplomat who represented China in multilateral talks on North Korea’s nuclear weapons, wrote that in the early 1990s, Pyongyang felt especially vulnerable following the collapse of the Soviet Union, its main diplomatic and financial benefactor during the Cold War. Around the same time, China opened diplomatic relations with South Korea, the North’s nemesis, while the United States and the South continued their military exercises, which the North viewed as a provocation. Feeling isolated, North Korea began its pursuit of nuclear weapons in earnest.

In the same article, Tong Zhao, a fellow at the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy, is recently quoted saying -

“For the Chinese, we feel we can tolerate a nuclear-armed North Korea in the foreseeable future while we work out the long-term disarmament strategy”

The article concludes -

So what does China want? Its plan to resolve the crisis is the so-called “freeze-for-freeze” proposal, in which North Korea would halt its missile and nuclear programs in exchange for the United States and South Korea suspending their joint military exercises—a nonstarter for Washington, which prefers to increase pressure on North Korea while holding open the offer of dialogue.

Unless China adopts America’s approach, at least in part (or vice versa), the crisis is unlikely to diminish. “Even though at the surface level they appear cooperative, deep down their approaches of dealing with North Korea are fundamentally different,” Zhao said. Ultimately, Zhao said, the nature of the disagreements between Washington and Beijing ensures that the crisis of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs will remain unresolved for some time to come.

firecat69 wrote:I have continued to visit HongKong and find the atmosphere in the city completely different since the Communists took HongKong back. I liked it a lot better when it was controlled by Capitalists instead of Communists. But most of the capitalists took their money and left before the Communists took over. I know that for sure since many of them moved to the USA. I see them in all our cities .

Well I'm really sorry that firecat69 preferred Hong Kong under the British colonial administration than under Chinese administration (actually it is Hong Kong people's administration, but I'll not belabour the point). Frankly, having visited Bali several times in the 1980s, I much preferred it then than when I re-visited it in the mid-2000s and mass tourism had taken over. Places change.

Did you really prefer Hong Kong under colonialism? I'm not sure you would have liked to live there quite as much as on your visits. I lived there from 1979 till 2001. For the first 12 years it was illegal to be gay and gay men were routinely sent to jail for between 2 years and life. Even though England had changed the old Victorian law in 1967, it was still on the statute books in Hong Kong. Maybe you would have gone to one of the two main gay bars that operated in those days, despite the law. Dateline on Hong Kong Island, perhaps. To reach that you had to descend quite a steep set of brightly floodlit steps. No, that was not to help patrons see the steps. It was to ensure sufficient light so that the cameras operated by the Police Special Investigations Unit and placed at the windows of a flat opposite could photograph every patron coming out.

Even after public outcry forced the government to change the law in 1991, the age of consent for consenting adults was set at 21. It was only after the capitalists left in 1997 that the age was reduced to 16 to bring it into line with that for females.

On the surface, colonial Hong Kong certainly was a glittering, forward-looking economic success story. Yet, according to a book by long-time Hong Kong resident Ken Bridgewater published only a few years ago, colonial Hong Kong “was shot through with a high level misuse of power, vice, triad infiltration, police incompetence and corruption, murder, extortion, blackmail, violence and intimidation. The underbelly of the colony was black and control of it was exercised ruthlessly.” Hardly the thriving, free, financial hub painted by the government’s spin masters.

As for capitalists, the suggestion that he "knows for sure" that "most" fled is another of firecat69's massively sweeping and completely untrue statements. The suggestion he offers is that capitalism - presumably under democracy - was better for Hong Kong than communism. Well, Hong Kong is not communist now and was never democratic. Further, perhaps he might ask himself this. If democratic Britain had really cared so much about Hong Kong and democracy after 1997, why did it do nothing in virtually all of its 150 or so years running the place to promote it? And is it not odd, considering firecat69''s erroneous statement, that Hong Kong's GDP per capita is still way ahead of that of the UK - or even of Canada, Japan and New Zealand?

That said, I agree Hong Kong has changed - in some cases for the better and in some cases not. Cities are not frozen in time.

Gaybutton wrote:If China thinks the USA does not intend to place nuclear weapons on the peninsula, then what's their excuse for failing to keep its word and enforce the sanctions?

I believe that question has already been answered. It is a fact that the USA wants China to solve the North Korean crisis - in large measure. China does not regard that as its responsibility. I understand China wants to maintain two nations on the peninsula - at least for the time being. I'm sure that the last thing it wants is a nuclear conflagration on its doorstep. The same will be true of Russia. If it were to take place in the summer, the prevailing winds would blow nuclear fallout over both countries. And presumably the powers in Beijing believe they can control the North if ever a crunch comes. How, I have no idea!

But clearly China believes the North can be contained in terms of using whatever nuclear arsenal it possesses. As for sanctions, CNN reported earlier today that the Chinese have been working much harder to enforce sanctions. I have no doubt that both China and Russia along with some other countries are breaking sanctions in some way. After all, when have international sanctions actually worked? I saw in Iran recently how Coca Cola is everywhere, despite stiff US sanctions. Are US companies breaking their country's own sanctions policy? I was told that Coca Cola is being imported from Malaysia via Dubai. both fellow Muslim countries. What pressure is the USA putting on Malaysia and Dubai to stop it? I have no idea. Same with the other foreign products I saw in Iran. Same with China and North Korea.

I have no idea what China, the USA and South Korea are doing in terms of negotiation. I trust a lot, because IMHO the only satisfactory solution to the NK issue will be through negotiations.